History Here
The Public History book sale is back!
📆Date: Thursday, May 22
⏰Time: 12 pm-1 pm
📍Location: HSSB 3208
Come by Thursday to browse a great selection of new and used books. (Cash or Venmo are accepted as payment)
LinkedIn Lab + Professional Photos
📆Date: Thursday, May 22
⏰Time: 1-3 pm
📍Location: Career Resource Room
Take advantage of the career center’s LinkedIn Lab for an open workspace where you can build and refine your LinkedIn profile at your own pace! Whether you’re updating your profile, fine-tuning your job search, or exploring networking strategies, we’re here to help. RSVPs are limited to 40 students. Link here!
Pathways to Careers for Historians in California State Parks
📆Date: Thursday, May 29
⏰Time: 12 pm-1 pm
📍Location: HSSB 4080
Blythe Wilson, Interpretation and Education Manager at California State Parks, will present on work for historians in the California State Park system. Information about various jobs in the California State Park system will be available as CSP is actively hiring.
UGH Journal – Spring 2025 Issue Launch – Ice Cream Social
📆Date Tuesday, May 27
⏰Time 5 pm
📍Location HSSB – Second Floor Patio
Come celebrate the publication of the biggest issue yet! There will be short videos from each author, speaking about their work. And Ice Cream. Hope you can join us!
Nature and Forest Therapy Retreat – UCSB Health & Wellness
📆Date Thursday, June 5th
⏰Time 1:15 pm-3 pm
📍Location Santa Barbara Botanic Garden
Join UCSB Health & Wellness for a guided retreat at the Santa Barbara Botanic Garden on June 5th, from 1:15 to 3:00 PM. Experience the calming embrace of nature through guided forest therapy and mindfulness sessions.
📀 SOTS Spotify Playlist 📀
Have you been voting in our Song of the Summer bracket? Help us pick the ultimate winner! Follow along on our Instagram @historicaljournal.ucsb – and vote for your fave every Tuesday and Thursday.
🌻 The Latest – Spring 2025 🌻
Caught Between Two Worlds: Princess Emma Sandile. Ashley Callahan
The Shadows of Repression: Homosexuality, Identity, and the Lasting Legacy of the Soviet GULag. Rafael Escoto
The Aztec Empire: A Grand-Strategic Case Study in Commercialism, Hegemony, and Defection. Matt Gardiner
The Roman Military Presence and Its Impact on Culinary Preferences in Britain. Charlie Gutteridge
Communication Networks that Tied Together Free and Enslaved People in the Era of the Haitian Revolution. Catriona Hobson
Diversity of Medical Practice in Mamluk Egypt During the Second Pandemic. Philip Karczmit
Shifting Narratives: Abortion, Newspapers, and Socio-Political Change in California in 1967-1973. Taylee Martinez
The Collections Built by Globalization. Ela Schulz
Contested Sexual Space: Britain’s Socio-legal Sexual Debates and Its Effects on Soho’s ‘Immoral Geography’. Noah Schwarz
“Paid to a Forged Order”: Counterfeit Continental Pay Orders and Their Impact on Veterans in Early Republic Massachusetts. Joella Shearer
Fragmented Faith: Group Imagination in the Early Hussite Period (1414-1420). Austin Skoda
Join us Tuesday, 27 May, at 5 PM, to celebrate our biggest issue yet! We’re having a Launch Party and Ice Cream Social on the second-floor patio at HSSB. 🍧 🍧 🍧 Stop by.
🎙️Unboxed – The Final Episode 🎙️
In the final episode of Unboxed S3 Kate dives into the life and legacy of a true Santa Barbara icon, James “Bud” Bottoms. You might know him as the spirited artist behind the playful dolphin sculpture at the end of State Street, right by Stearns Wharf. But he was also a passionate environmental activist who led a one-man charge to “Get Out Oil!” (otherwise known as GOO!), after the devastating oil spill of 1969. The episode builds off of Valerie Holland’s amazing season two episode “Beyond the Spill.” So be sure to go back and give that a listen, too!
🌱 Life After UGH 🌱
We asked Zoë (2022). She answered. What have you been up to since you left the UGH Editorial Board? After UGH, I moved to NYC! I went to grad school at Columbia, and now I work for an expert network firm. What was the most enjoyable paper you worked on as an UGH Editor and why? “The Hierarchy of Dress: Clothing in the Age of the Emancipation” by Emilia Salcido. This paper explores the meaning of freedom through material culture. I loved the way the author connects clothing to systems of control, race, class, and gender, especially for Black women, in such a compelling and interesting manner. What is your best (or most ridiculous) UGH Editorial Board memory? Our GIVE Day photoshoot! We were doing different poses on the staircase outside the room with handmade paper signs, and it was just a silly time. Do you have advice for anyone interested in joining the UGH Editorial Board in the future? You’re gonna be reading about new topics of history that may not be in your area of expertise, so be open to brainstorming and editing ideas as a team. If you’re passionate about history and enjoy reading about different time periods, it’s a really rewarding experience!
🔍 micro historia – no. 4 🔍
Our latest micro historia post – “Reading Empire Through Ancient Eyes” by Bridget Panina is now live.
Bridget asks: was Cyrus the Younger truly favored by the gods—or crafted to appear that way?
This close reading of Anabasis explores how religious symbolism, moral virtue, and narrative framing were used to construct an image of legitimate imperial power in the Achaemenid Persian Empire.
The UCSB Thesis Digital Library – 🚨 Now Live 🚨
You may have noticed a new addition to our website – the UCSB History Thesis Digital Library. This collection, digitized by Cece Chao, Adrian Hernandez, Gizelle Perezchica, Melissa Van Bebber, and Jiana Williams, and History Undergraduate Advisor, Kiara Actis, brings together the theses they have been able to locate and preserve.
It documents the intellectual curiosity, archival research, and historical writing of undergraduates across the decades. From early drafts produced on typewriters to recent digital submissions, these works reflect evolving scholarly questions, changing methodologies, and the rich diversity of topics explored by students in history at UC Santa Barbara.
If you have a copy of a thesis that is not yet digitized here, or if you are a former student interested in contributing your work that we are missing, do get in touch.
🧃 It’s Giving Me 🧃
Hello everyone! I appreciate you all for taking the time to read this week’s newsletter, I really hope you enjoy it. My name is Travis Applegate, a third-year History of Public Policy and Law major and an editor at The UGH Journal. I hope to offer some encouragement and tips in finishing strong in your studies as the end of spring quarter and finals slowly approach.
As I finish my third year, I’ve experienced many stressful and overwhelming quarters. By this point in the quarter, I’m wrapping up midterms and starting to think about final exams and papers. My days are filled with attending lectures, studying whenever I can, and making time to hang out with friends. It’s very easy to feel stretched thin as finals approach.
What helps me is breaking my workload into more manageable pieces and setting daily goals. Even outlining an essay or writing a single page of a paper helps prevent me from becoming overly stressed throughout the week.
Alongside tackling your weekly schedule piece by piece, making time for yourself is equally important. Whether taking a walk, going to the Rec Center, or hanging out with friends, these activities help you reset and avoid burnout. Doom-scrolling TikTok or Instagram Reels, however, doesn’t count as a mental reset.
Lastly, take time to enjoy some fun activities in Santa Barbara on the weekends—especially if you’re graduating soon. This is your time to check off that UCSB bucket list. I imagine that by this time next year, I’ll be finishing mine by kayaking out to the oil rig.
Give yourself some credit for everything you’ve accomplished so far this year, and look forward to what you’ll achieve by the end of the quarter. Wishing you a great rest of the quarter, –Travis Applegate
Submit your research anytime via our online portal. Manuscripts for the Journal should be 3,500-7,500 words and completed during undergraduate coursework at an accredited institution. Recent graduates may submit within 12 months of earning their degree. The journal is published biannually in Spring and Fall. To submit to Microhistories, make that notation in your submission. Visit our website for more info.